


In the Hearts of Man

by nagi_schwarz



Series: Play Along [28]
Category: Stargate Atlantis, Stargate SG-1
Genre: Alternate Universe - Rock Band, M/M, band au, musician au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-06
Updated: 2016-08-06
Packaged: 2018-07-29 17:46:24
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,318
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7693681
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nagi_schwarz/pseuds/nagi_schwarz
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Written for the comment_fic prompt: "Stargate Multiverse, Any, Harmonizing."</p><p>Rodney asks John why he's still with Cam, and too much honesty ensues.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In the Hearts of Man

Ronon wasn’t sure what had happened between John and Rodney, but last night, John had joined them in the mosh pit. So when he stayed with them on the bus on the way to the next venue, Ronon was cautiously optimistic about John and Rodney being friends again, but also nervous that things were going badly between John and Cam. Not that they’d seemed bad. John had slept on the Snakeskinners bus after the show, only he’d come back to the Space Monkeys bus when both buses pulled over for breakfast.  
  
Rodney was scratching away in one of his black notebooks - the song book and the physics book looked identical - and John was working on one of his sudoku puzzles. And then Rodney started humming. John joined in absently, as did Teyla, who was sending text messages to Kanaan - or possibly helping Evan with the creepy stalker blog about her that her family used to keep in touch with her. Ronon joined in as well. He was sketching the Satedan skyline for Amelia, wanted her to know what his homeland looked like.  
  
“Did you know,” Evan said, “that you harmonize when you hum?”  
  
Rodney broke off and blinked. “What?”  
  
John and Teyla echoed his puzzled sentiment.  
  
“When you hum as a group like that, you harmonize. I didn’t recognize the song, but Rodney was carrying the melody, and the rest of you were carrying harmonies.” Evan’s tone was carefully polite. Rodney was still angry at him. Ronon was glad someone had helped coordinate his grandfather’s care. And Teyla didn’t seem to mind the efforts Evan had gone to, to help her family while she was on the road.  
  
“Oh. Well. We are a band,” Rodney said. Then he closed his notebook and tucked it back into his jacket. “Hey, John?”  
  
John glanced up from his puzzle book. “Hm?”  
  
“How are you in love with me?”  
  
“Jennifer was in love with you. It’s not that hard.”  
  
Evan turned several different shades of red and said something about going to get coffee and retreated to the kitchen, locking the door behind him.  
  
“Subtle,” Ronon muttered. Teyla nudged him but said nothing. Her hands had stilled, and she was listening to the conversation, but at a casual glance she was still playing on her phone.  
  
“You’re not Jennifer,” Rodney pointed out.  
  
“Obviously not.” John closed his puzzle book and set it aside, met Rodney’s gaze. “But that doesn’t mean I never saw what she saw in you.”  
  
“How do you know what she saw in me?”  
  
“We talked about you, when I went to visit her,” John said.  
  
Rodney raised his eyebrows. “You visited her? I thought -”  
  
“I went home to check in with my oncologist - routine check-up, no worries - and I stopped in to say hi to Jennifer, and we talked. You'd told her how I felt about you, and we had - girl talk, as it were.”  
  
“Oh. Um.” Rodney blushed.  
  
“Like that right there.” John waved a hand at Rodney. “When you get embarrassed or angry, you blush, and it’s kind of adorable. ‘S why I played dumb in class, sometimes. To watch you freak out.”  
  
Ronon was pretty sure that wasn’t the main reason, because John had an unhealthy need for negative attention from people he really, really cared about, like his father, but he said nothing, because he was curious. He and Teyla had figured out pretty early on how much John liked Rodney, but they’d never talked about it.  
  
“But...I was mean to you,” Rodney said.  
  
“Well, apart from hating me for allegedly breaking Jeannie’s heart - she says you grossly exaggerate her mourning, by the way - you really didn’t treat me any differently from anyone else who wasn’t Jeannie or Jennifer. We’ve talked about this before. You demanded the same excellence from everyone else that you demanded from yourself. Sometimes that was very misguided, but a lot of times it was also helpful. We’re all better musicians for it.” John’s smile was small, secret, like he was telling an inside joke to a group of one.  
  
“But I’m...me,” Rodney said finally.  
  
“Yes,” John said. “You are. You’re brilliant and talented. You write the songs I sing in my soul. You have so much heart and passion, and you give all of yourself to everything you pursue. Also, I don’t know if Jennifer’s ever told you this - I’m sure she has - you’re sexy as hell.”  
  
Rodney opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He stared at John for a long time, then closed his mouth, swallowed hard.

“You have been waiting to say those words for a long time, have you not?” Teyla asked.  
  
John shrugged. “I have.”  
  
Finally, Rodney said, “Why?”  
  
“Why do I love you? I could go on, if you like.” John’s smile was small and secretive again.  
  
“Why are you still with Mitchell?”  
  
Ronon winced, and Teyla lifted her head, alert, ready to play mediator as she had so many times before.  
  
“Cam’s a great guy - kind, loving, warm, funny, handsome, talented. And he understands where I am, has been in the same situation. He toughed it out on his own before he managed to move on, so he’s being supportive of me.” John shrugged.  
  
Rodney’s expression was unreadable, which was unusual, because Rodney was very open about his emotions. “He’s being supportive of you...moving on?”  
  
John nodded earnestly. “Look, you’re not obligated to love me back. This isn’t some rom-com where you’re the Leading Lady and I’m the Nice Guy who’s been waiting in the wings all along for you to see that your True Love is actually The Jerk. It was why I never told you before. I mean, sure, for a while there I kept hoping you’d wake up and realize you were madly in love with me and leave Jennifer for me, but that was high school, and we’re not in high school anymore. It’s time to grow up, right?”  
  
Rodney said nothing.  
  
“I get it,” John continued. “I was being a stupid kid, unable to talk about my feelings but hoping everyone would figure out what I couldn’t say. Ronon and Teyla are great friends, and they knew, so they kind of enabled me to continue being stupid. Well, all the cards are on the table, we’ve played the hands we were dealt, and this is where we are. I love you, you don’t love me back, and Cam Mitchell is a really nice guy who won’t be heartbroken when I do move on and find someone new. Who knows - he might even find someone first.”  
  
“So, maybe too much honesty,” Ronon began.  
  
John leaned in, gazed earnestly at Rodney. “It’s like you said at the beginning, we don’t have to like each other to work together. Although for a while there we were friends, right? I think we can get back to that. If you want. But if you don’t want to, we’ll be okay. We were for years.”  
  
“Yeah,” Rodney said. “We’ll be okay.”  
  
John smiled. “I’m really glad.” Then he sat back and heaved a sigh of relief. “Okay, wow, that was hard. I don’t know how Cam does it. Talking about feelings is hard.”  
  
Rodney ducked his head, opened one of his notebooks.  
  
John reached out and tapped on the kitchen door. “Okay. We’re done now. You can stop pretending to make coffee. Hope you listened to David Gilmour’s new album or something fun instead.”  
  
The kitchen door opened, and of course Evan brought all of them coffee. Then he sat down beside Teyla and began poking at his phone, likely adjusting their schedule.  
  
“You know,” John said, “for the last night of the tour, we should go electric again. Because we can.”  
  
Ronon glanced at Rodney, who didn’t seem to have heard. “I’m in,” Ronon said.  
  
Teyla smiled cautiously. “As am I.”  
  
Rodney began humming again.  
  
John joined in.


End file.
